I wrote in the first week of September 1997. Princess Diana had just died and the news world was thrown into silence. The calm before the storm, the paps got hammered and yet the papers rolled off with every money making spin off they could. I remember Radio 1 played the same loop of songs including the haunting theme from Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence. Click here to listen.

I was sat, parked somewhere along the spine of road network that connects our truly brilliant country and I penned this, I was 22 years old.